BOSTON — Tuukka Rask was so strong in net tonight, the Bruins didn’t need Zdeno Chara on defense to shut out Los Angeles, 3-0, at the TD Garden.

That might be an overstatement, but the Kings’ league-worst offense was no match for Rask. The goaltender finished with 41 saves, including 20 in the third period.

The good news got better for the Bruins because after the game, head coach Claude Julien confirmed that Chara would make the road trip. The Bruins play in Ottawa Wednesday and Philadelphia Saturday. The captain wouldn’t be traveling unless there was a chance for him to return from a leg injury. Gregory Campbell, out with a fractured foot, did not make the trip.

Brad Marchand scored twice in support of Rask, who has now won two games in a row. It’ll be interesting to see if Julien sticks to his plan of playing Tim Thomas against the Senators. After the game, Julien was asked about his started and he responded with “That’s none of your business.”

Having Tuuka in net is granting the Bruins a major advantage over every other team that has some hack backup goaltender. Every time they start Tuuka it allows the Bruins to remain almost the same competitively and allows Timmy much needed rest due to his style of play and age. Tuuka could easily be the starting goaltender on this Bruins team or almost 3/4 of the teams around the NHL. We better hold on to this kid, look at his save % over the past three years, it is great. This kid will be starting for the Bruins for ten years after Timmy retires; if they hold on to him.

The defense and Julien’s system does help the goalie’s numbers but there is no system in the world that could make a goalie play as well as Thomas has played since his hip surgery two years ago.

To the guys that say Rask is susceptible to high shots. You are right, every butterfly goaltender is, just look at Luongo. Luongo’s glove side high was so open last year at times that PJ Stock could have scored on it. However, butterfly goalies sacrifice the glove side and above the blocker to take away the lower half of the net. Somewhere around 75% of the goals in the NHL are scored within the bottom foot of the net, so this is not a bad tactic.

@Bruins16
Yeah, Nathan looked good in camp and probably could have made the squad if we weren’t up to our ears in defensemen.
There’s a couple other mini-habs (or just habs to you guys) on the team. Gallagher is a crazy offensive lil guy that should do well on the international ice and Bournival looks like he’ll do well also (we gave up O’Byrne for him).

Drove to Calgary and watched the Canadian Junior Team play and your Hab pick Beaulieu looked good. I was glad to see him beat out Murphy, thought that he played better and hustled more. Still glad we were able to get Dougie Hamilton.

Bojangles
Your right! Not many teams have been on this kind of a run in the last ten years, so why mess with a good thing?

Cormac
I think I have to taste a bigger slice of humble pie. I was big supporter of Caron over Pouliot, but Pouliot has done well. He is a different player. Still like Caron, but Pouliot has earned his ice time.

Rask is a good guy who doesn’t get much spotlight. Given Thomas’ years, it’s good Boston has arguably the best backup in the league. There will come a day when Thomas will show his age. I have no idea when but it has to happen one day.

PD & Beantown. Again – maybe, but a team needs to know what its dealing with, with a coach. If a coach just starts switching lines on whims, even when the team in on a tear it sends a message of instability to the players. PC is predictable in how he handles his players, and they’ve grown to understand his rules for how he handles them. Mess with that, and you mess with the foundation.

The team is crankin’ – you don’t reward that by messin’ with guys’ heads.

Cormac,
Doughty was one of their better players all night. He was the reason for a reasonable number of their rushes, and didn’t suck defensively (which is more than can be said for the rest of the team.) He isn’t putting up the same points or playing like he’s on a team, but then again, no one on that team was.

@bojangles, that was my first thought too but then it dawned on me that Segeuin/Krecji/Lucic would be a pretty awesome PP unit. Lucic in front causing trouble and Krejci feeding Seguin for the shot. A thing of beauty I suspect.

I have such high praise for the way Julien handles everything about this team. My one complaint is his stubbornness with lines.

Krejci and Seguin have not been paired together once this season. As much as i love the dynamic of the Marchy Bergy Segzy line, Horton needs to pulled off the top line for a couple games so he can stop thwarting Lucic and krejci’s dominance. I truly believe Krejci would be a PPG player or at least closer to one had he not been held back by Horton thus far in the season. I can’t even imagine what krejc Looch and Segz could accomplish on the same line. Remember Looch and Segzy’s chemistry for those two games they were together? Add in Krejci’s playmaking and that line is fearful for any opposition. C’mon Claude lets see it. GO B’S!

Many of their players weren’t all that good last night. Jack Johnson wasn’t noticeable, and Kopitar was bad. He didn’t make a single nice move the entire night. Also their defensman #26 (Vonyov I think) must have thought he was on the Bruins or something because he made 5 giveaways at least by my count. Tuukka was awesome, but so was Quick (no matter what the numbers say.)

Man, it’s easy to see how they got their coach gassed. They didn’t even seem to recognize that there are two other zones on the ice, besides the attacking one! If it wasn’t for Quick, that game would have been outta hand in the first 10.